Pallas's Bunting

Overview

Pallas's Bunting: Medium bunting, gray-brown upperparts with black streaks. Lower breast, belly, and undertail coverts are white. Head, throat and upper breast are black. Collar and moustache stripe are white. Tail is black with white outer feathers and corners. Black bill, legs, feet.

Range and Habitat

Pallas's Bunting: Native of Asia; recorded on St. Lawrence Island and the western mainland of Alaska. Frequents reed beds in wetlands, lakes, and along streams in taiga and tundra; winters in grasslands and marshlands.

INTERESTING FACTS

The Pallas's Bunting is named after the German zoologist Peter Simon Pallas.
Buntings are the Old World equivalents of the species known in North America as (American) sparrows.
A group of buntings are collectively known as a "decoration", "mural", and "sacrifice" of buntings.

The Pallas's Bunting has a tremendous range estimated at roughly 10,000,000 square kilometers. This bird can be found in China, Japan, Korea, Mongolia, Myanmar, Taiwan, Kazakhstan, and the United States. Its habitats include shrubland, grassland, wetlands and arable or farm areas. The global population of this species is estimated to be around 160,000 to 300,000 individual birds. It is not believed that the population trends for this species will soon approach the minimum levels that could suggest a potential decline in population. Due to this, population trends for the Pallas's Bunting have a present evaluation level of Least Concern.